Roy Jones Jr, the end of boxing

We all know boxing has replaced MMA in a lot of different ways, from the big fight nights in Vegas to the the diminishing of boxing superstars, where names like Edwin Valero, and Roy Jones Jr are not as much of a household name as Chuck Liddell or Tito Ortiz you can look at a timeline in history where boxing fell to what we now see on TV. In 1988 Roy Jones Jr was controversially robbed of a win to some obviously biased judges in Korea, after this controversial fight, boxing corporations began to use computers where their judges would tally points due to strikes to base a winner, rather than an overall damage factor, which has led more modern boxers into more of a kind of "sparring" fighter rather than a knockout artist. As more organizations became more possesive over their boxing superstars, fans grew tired of never seeing dream matchups due to issues similar to those between M-1 and the UFC where companies would not cross-promote to put on the best fights, and in 1993 UFC 1 happened and in 15 years the UFC has completely overrun boxing in viewers, fans, major events, and super-stardom. You see Dana White on TV a lot more than Don King nowadays.

Now people like Roy Jones are involving themselves in what was before an untouchable topic in his interest in a boxing match with Anderson Silva, that untouchable topic being the UFC and boxing having anything to do with each other, neither side giving an inch and standing by their fighters as the best around in their respected divisions of combat sports, but Silva is looking to change all that and unify the two sports and show that a MMA fighter can strike just as hard, just as fast, and just as accurate as any boxer alive today. Now we find two major sports crossing paths with two household names among the fans and yet this time the UFC is not giving an inch in having a cross promoted boxing match, potentially worth the love of both fanbases. If Silva were to win it would establish MMA as a solid combat sport among boxing fans, and if Jones were to win it would establish a sense that pugilism is so much more in depth than what Silva already does. Either way you can expect a beautiful battle and potentially gain respect from both sides and a unification of the two sports rather than a loss of one or the other (not that MMA is going anywhere) it would be a good business move for Dana White to dip into the fanbase of boxing in showing off a fighter like Anderson Silva in the ring, proving he can translate what he does into boxing. It ended with Roy Jones and it may very well begin with him in a more boxing/mma unified world.

SmileR

8/12/08 6:45:50PM

Did you write that or is it from a website? I'm not knocking you, just interested to see if there is any more. Its a good read.

fullerene

8/12/08 7:51:33PM

Interesting post, but I respectfully disagree with the fundamental premise in several ways:* Boxing is not doing poorly at all. It is as popular as ever in traditional places like Mexico, Cuba, Japan and the UK and more popular than ever in places like Germany and the Phillipines. It is true that it is not so popular in the U.S. right now.* The boxing quality is as good as it's ever been worldwide. There are probably more total participants because of it's popularity growth in SE Asia, Eastern Europe and Western Africa and some weight classes, like super middleweight, cruiserweight and featherweight have seen some of the best eras in their history in the last 5 years. The problem is not a lack of quality boxers, although again I have to concede that the quality of U.S. boxers is not good from a historical perspective* Changes in the amateur scoring have not made amateur boxing styles unsuitable for the pros. Amateur boxing success is still the best (but not exclusive) inidcator of boxing potential and many of the stars of today--Oscar De La Hoya, Floyd Mayweather, Wladamir Klitshko, Jermain Taylor, Miguel Cotto, etc.--are Olympic medalists* MMA and boxing are not incompatible. Boxing makes up a major aspect of MMA fighting and training and most professional MMA fighters will have worked with a pro boxing trainer or sparring partner at some point. Boxing's attraction is seeing great athletes struggle to prove who is tougher and more skilled--the same appeal that should make many of them appreciate MMA as well.

SmileR

8/12/08 8:22:33PM

Posted by fullerene

Interesting post, but I respectfully disagree with the fundamental premise in several ways:* Boxing is not doing poorly at all. It is as popular as ever in traditional places like Mexico, Cuba, Japan and the UK and more popular than ever in places like Germany and the Phillipines. It is true that it is not so popular in the U.S. right now.* The boxing quality is as good as it's ever been worldwide. There are probably more total participants because of it's popularity growth in SE Asia, Eastern Europe and Western Africa and some weight classes, like super middleweight, cruiserweight and featherweight have seen some of the best eras in their history in the last 5 years. The problem is not a lack of quality boxers, although again I have to concede that the quality of U.S. boxers is not good from a historical perspective* Changes in the amateur scoring have not made amateur boxing styles unsuitable for the pros. Amateur boxing success is still the best (but not exclusive) inidcator of boxing potential and many of the stars of today--Oscar De La Hoya, Floyd Mayweather, Wladamir Klitshko, Jermain Taylor, Miguel Cotto, etc.--are Olympic medalists* MMA and boxing are not incompatible. Boxing makes up a major aspect of MMA fighting and training and most professional MMA fighters will have worked with a pro boxing trainer or sparring partner at some point. Boxing's attraction is seeing great athletes struggle to prove who is tougher and more skilled--the same appeal that should make many of them appreciate MMA as well.

Excellent post man! I tried to prop but alas got to spread the love! I couldn't agree more with what you have posted. Heres a public prop

PaleHorse

8/14/08 1:10:45PM

Posted by SmileR

Did you write that or is it from a website? I'm not knocking you, just interested to see if there is any more. Its a good read.

I was going through some history books and wrote this up myself. As for the guy who responded with "boxing is still up", try watching olympic boxing and tell me that its half as exciting now as it used to be. Everyone goes for points now, knockouts are rare, and judging is 10x more flawed than mma. If you don't miss Rocky Marciano dropping almost 90% of the heavyweights and prefer watching sparring sessions, stay loyal to how things are being run right now.

fullerene

8/14/08 1:56:57PM

Posted by PaleHorse

Everyone goes for points now, knockouts are rare, and judging is 10x more flawed than mma. If you don't miss Rocky Marciano dropping almost 90% of the heavyweights and prefer watching sparring sessions, stay loyal to how things are being run right now.

Rocky Marciano was not KOing people in the Olympics, since he never fought there. He did have an impressive 87.76% KO rate as a professional. The current boxing champ (forget the alphabet champs) is Wladamir Klitshko who has a 83.33% KO rate. That's not much of a difference in KOs, especially since Marciano had 15 rounds to do it in and he was, quite frankly, a better and more dominant HW champion. If you think that KOs aren't possible in today's game, take a look at how Edwin Valero is doing so far:

I think the reasons it doesn't seem like guys are as good are twofold:1) Guys like Marciano and Robinson were American; guys like Klitshko and Valero are not.2) Back in the 50s there weren't athletes competing on a professional scale to challenge boxers for the right of being the toughest guys in the world and now MMA fighters (as well as K-1 fighters) are doing that. So a guy like Klitschko doesn't have the larger-than-life mystique that previous HW boxing champs had.

I'm actually very critical of certain aspects of boxing: not having the top fighters fight enough, having every other title defense be a gift defense, weak, mismatched undercards, out-of-touch,aged boxing writers and analysts, corrupt promotion, corrupt sanctioning, corrupt judging...I just don't think one of those problems is a lack of talented boxers.

Aaronno9

8/14/08 2:38:47PM

Posted by PaleHorse

Posted by SmileR

Did you write that or is it from a website? I'm not knocking you, just interested to seef there is any more. Its a good read.

I was going through some history books and wrote this up myself. As for the guy who responded with "boxing is still up", try watching olympic boxing and tell me that its half as exciting now as it used to be. Everyone goes for points now, knockouts are rare, and judging is 10x more flawed than mma. If you don't miss Rocky Marciano dropping almost 90% of the heavyweights and prefer watching sparring sessions, stay loyal to how things are being run right now.

Using the olympics is a little flawed becouse -

The judging is differant to that of pro boxing, and the olympic scoring is alot trickier. I do agree though, it sucks. Its not rare to see somebody connect flush with a jab and it not be scored, then somebody throw a wild haymacker which is 90% blocked and they get a point.

As for the lack k.os, its obviously harder to get a k.o, becouse of the short fights and head gear. Although GB's David price got a second round k.o just a few days ago over Timurziev, so it does still happen.